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FMGE
Foreign Medical Graduate Examination
📝 Medical Licensing Examination Computer-based test (CBT). ⏱ Valid: A cleared FMGE result does not expire and remains valid for medical registration in India indefinitely. Since 2002 ⚡ Considered genuinely demanding given historically low first-attempt pass rates, reflecting both the breadth of clinical knowledge tested and the challenge of translating training completed under a different country's

🕐 Last updated: September 7, 2026
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Quick Summary

FMGE is India's mandatory licensing screen for Indian citizens and OCIs who completed their medical degree abroad, and unlike NEET UG or NEET PG, it functions purely as a pass/fail check against a flat 150-out-of-300 (50%) qualifying mark rather than any competitive ranking system. The exam splits into two 2.5-hour sessions in one day, each further broken into three individually time-boxed 50-minute sections with no ability to revisit a closed one — a section-locked structure that echoes NEET PG's own design even though FMGE serves an entirely different, non-competitive purpose. With no negative marking, no age limit, and no cap on the number of attempts, candidates can keep reattempting across what NBEMS expanded to three annual sessions in 2026, a genuinely more forgiving retake structure than most Indian medical exams offer — though the historically low first-attempt pass rate means treating any single sitting as low-stakes rarely serves candidates well. Because FMGE tests broad clinical knowledge against Indian MBBS-curriculum expectations regardless of where a candidate actually trained, switching preparation materials to standard Indian reference texts — rather than continuing with whatever curriculum a foreign medical school used — is one of the most consequential adjustments a candidate can make.

📋 Exam Overview
🎯
Score Range
0 to 300
💳
Fee
₹6,195 to ₹7,080 approx. (inclusive of 18% GST; exact amount varies slightly by session)
📅
Valid For
A cleared FMGE result does not expire and remains valid for medical registration in India indefinitely.
🖥
Mode
Computer-based test (CBT).
🗓
Frequency
Three times a year (expanding from the historical twice-yearly schedule), with an additional session announced for October 2026
🏛
Conducted By
National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS)
⚡
Difficulty
Considered genuinely demanding given historically low first-attempt pass rates, reflecting both the breadth of clinical knowledge tested and the challenge of translating training completed under a different country's medical curriculum into India's specific licensing expectations.
📊
Pass Rate
Historically low among first-time test-takers, though NBEMS does not publish an official year-by-year percentage; a substantial share of each sitting's qualifiers are repeat candidates.
The licensing screen for Indians who studied medicine abroad, unlimited attempts allowed but a genuinely tough 50% bar that most first-timers don't clear
👀 Who Should Take This Exam?
Any Indian citizen or OCI who completed their MBBS-equivalent medical degree outside India and wants to practice medicine in India needs to clear FMGE, since it's the mandatory licensing screen for foreign medical graduates regardless of which country they studied in. Unlike NEET UG or NEET PG, which determine admission into a program, FMGE is purely a licensing exam sat after medical training is already complete, closer in spirit to a professional bar exam than an entrance test. Because there's no cap on the number of attempts, a candidate who doesn't clear the 50% qualifying mark on a first try can keep reattempting at any of the now three annual sittings, though the genuinely low historical pass rate among first-time test-takers means most successful candidates don't clear it on their first attempt.
🎓 Education Level
Professional Licensing Examination
🌍 Accepted In
India
📝 Exam Structure & Format
Question Types
Multiple-choice questions only.
Language / Medium
English
Total Duration
5 hours total, split into a morning session (2.5 hours) and an afternoon session (2.5 hours) on the same day.
Total Questions
300 questions total, 150 per session
Sections
Morning session (150 questions, Sections A/B/C), Afternoon session (150 questions, Sections A/B/C)
⚙ More format details (timing, marking, equipment)See all â–Ÿ
Time Per Section
Each of the six sections (three per session) gets a fixed 50 minutes; once that window expires, the exam moves on automatically with no way back.
Negative Marking
No
Calculator Allowed
No — calculators and any electronic aids are strictly prohibited.
Scratch Paper
Yes — a rough sheet is provided at the test centre and must be submitted before leaving.
Breaks Allowed
A break separates the morning and afternoon sessions; no breaks occur within the six individually time-boxed sections themselves.
Home Edition
No — FMGE is administered only at NBEMS-designated test centres.
📑 Section Details
Each of the two 150-question sessions is itself broken into three time-boxed sections of 50 questions each, with exactly 50 minutes allotted per section — once that window closes, the exam automatically advances and a candidate cannot return to a completed section, similar in spirit to NEET PG's own section-locked design. This means a candidate effectively manages six separate 50-minute blocks across the full exam day rather than two simple 2.5-hour sessions with free internal navigation.
🎯 Scoring System
Score Range
0 to 300
Good / Passing Score
150 out of 300 (50%) is required to qualify, applied as a fixed threshold rather than a percentile-based or normalized cutoff.
How Scoring Works
Each of the 300 questions is worth 1 mark with no penalty for a wrong answer, and a candidate needs 150 out of 300 (50%) to qualify. There's no percentile or normalization process involved, since the 50% threshold is applied as a flat, fixed bar rather than adjusted against that particular sitting's applicant pool — unlike NEET UG or JEE Main, a candidate's raw score is all that matters.
🏆 Minimum Scores for Top Universities
There's effectively only one relevant number for FMGE — the flat 150-out-of-300 qualifying mark. It doesn't vary by institute, program, or sitting, since FMGE is a licensing exam rather than a competitive admission test with variable cutoffs.
All Sub-Scores
No section-wise or session-wise sub-scores are disclosed to candidates — only the combined total out of 300 and the qualify/not-qualify outcome.
🔌 Score Improvement
NBEMS does not publish a standardized retake-improvement figure, though given how many candidates require multiple attempts to clear the 50% mark, a meaningful share of each sitting's qualifiers are repeat test-takers rather than first-timers.
💳 Registration & Fees
Fee (USD)
₹6,195 to ₹7,080 approx. (inclusive of 18% GST; exact amount varies slightly by session)
~ approx. equivalent
Fee (INR)
₹6,195 to ₹7,080 depending on the specific session, inclusive of 18% GST.
Other
The fee is charged per attempt, so a candidate reattempting after an unsuccessful sitting pays the full fee again for each subsequent try.
📝 Register Now →
📋 Policies (rescheduling, cancellation, verification, waivers)See all â–Ÿ
⏰ Register in Advance
Registration windows open roughly a month or two ahead of each of the three annual sessions (December/January, April/May, and August/September, with an additional October sitting announced for 2026).
🔄 Rescheduling Policy
NBEMS does not permit individual rescheduling once a slot is allotted; a candidate unable to sit must register again for a future session.
❌ Cancellation Policy
Once submitted, the registration fee is generally non-refundable.
🔍 Score Verification
Limited formal recheck options exist beyond NBEMS's own standard result-declaration process, since the exam is entirely multiple-choice and machine-scored.
↩ Reinstatement Policy
No
📅 Exam Dates & Schedule
📆 Available Months
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
🔁 Frequency
Three times a year (expanding from the historical twice-yearly schedule), with an additional session announced for October 2026
📊 Results Declared
Results are typically declared within a few weeks of each session's exam date.
🔄 Retake Policy
No limit on the number of attempts and no age limit — a candidate can reattempt at any future session until they clear the 50% qualifying mark.
⏰ Register By
Registration windows open roughly a month or two ahead of each of the three annual sessions (December/January, April/May, and August/September, with an additional October sitting announced for 2026).
✅ Eligibility & Access
🎂 Age Limit
No age limit, consistent with FMGE's unlimited-attempts policy.
🎓 Education Required
A recognized foreign medical degree (equivalent to MBBS) along with completion of any required internship components specified by India's National Medical Commission.
🛂 Citizenship
Open to Indian citizens and Overseas Citizens of India (OCI) who completed their medical degree at a foreign institution.
More on accommodations, ID, and special versionsSee all â–Ÿ
🪪 ID Required
Yes — a valid original photo ID matching the registration details is mandatory for entry to the test centre.
♿ Accessibility
Compensatory time and scribe facility are available for candidates with documented disabilities per government PwD guidelines, arranged during the registration process.
🔀 Special Versions
Scribe-assisted and compensatory-time arrangements for PwD candidates; no separate distinct exam format beyond standard accommodations.
📐 Subject Variants
None — every candidate sits the identical 300-question exam regardless of which foreign country or institution they trained at.
🀝 Disability Accommodations
Compensatory time and scribe assistance are available for candidates with benchmark disabilities per government PwD guidelines, arranged through prior application during registration.
🗓 Exam Day Guide
✅ What to Bring
A valid original photo ID matching the registration details and the admit card issued after registration.
🚫 Prohibited Items
Phones, smartwatches, calculators, and any electronic devices; textual notes; and any item not explicitly permitted on the admit card's instructions.
📋 Exam Day Rules
Candidates must report well before the reporting time for both the morning and afternoon sessions, since late entry is not permitted once a session's gate closes; standard identity verification procedures apply at all centres.
After the exam: score reporting and deliverySee all â–Ÿ
⏱ Score Reporting
Typically within a few weeks of each session's exam date.
📀 Score Sending
A cleared FMGE result is submitted by the candidate directly to the National Medical Commission as part of the medical registration process — there is no automated third-party score-sending system.
🎓 Score Recipients
The candidate directly, who then submits proof of qualifying to the National Medical Commission for registration purposes.
📚 Preparation Guide
🗓 Avg Prep Months
8 months
Because FMGE tests the same broad clinical and pre-clinical medical knowledge base as NEET PG, though at a licensing rather than competitive-ranking level of difficulty, most effective preparation resembles NEET PG revision adapted specifically to FMGE's flat 50% qualifying bar rather than a percentile-chasing mindset. Given the exam's low first-attempt pass rate, treating a first sitting with the same seriousness as a final attempt — rather than as a low-stakes trial run — tends to produce better outcomes than an under-prepared initial try.
💡 Top Tips & Tricks
Since there's no negative marking, attempting every single question — including a pure guess on ones a candidate is completely unsure about — always beats leaving something blank, unlike on exams that penalize wrong answers. Because each of the six sections is a hard 50-minute cutoff with no return, working through easier questions within a section first and flagging harder ones for a later pass within that same section's window tends to protect against running out of time on questions a candidate could otherwise have answered.
Full study plan, resources, and common mistakesSee all â–Ÿ
📅 Study Plan
Several months of systematic subject-wise revision across the full MBBS curriculum, drawing on standard Indian medical reference texts rather than whatever curriculum a candidate's foreign medical school used, tends to close the specific gap FMGE is designed to test for. Because the six sections are individually time-boxed at 50 minutes each with no ability to revisit a closed section, timed practice specifically simulating that six-block structure matters as much as content review itself.
📖 Recommended Books
Standard Indian MBBS reference texts across all subjects, alongside FMGE-specific question banks published by providers like PrepLadder and Marrow, form the typical preparation base.
🏫 Popular Prep Courses
PrepLadder, Marrow, and DAMS all offer FMGE-specific preparation courses distinct from their broader NEET PG coaching.
📱 Popular Prep Apps
PrepLadder and Marrow both offer FMGE-specific question banks and mock tests aligned with the section-locked format.
✅ Official Practice Tests
NBEMS publishes official past FMGE papers on its portal, reflecting the current section-locked, six-block format. — Free — NBEMS's official past papers carry no cost.
🆓 Free Online Resources
NBEMS publishes official past FMGE papers and guidelines on its portal, offering a genuinely free look at the real question format.
⚠ Common Mistakes to Avoid
Studying primarily from the curriculum and reference materials used at a candidate's own foreign medical school, rather than switching to standard Indian MBBS texts specifically aligned with FMGE's actual question style, is one of the most common and consequential preparation gaps. Treating an early attempt as a low-stakes trial run, given the unlimited-attempts policy, is another frequent misjudgment — since the pass rate is genuinely low even among serious first-time candidates, under-preparing for a first sitting rarely pays off as a strategy.
💡 EduAtlasHub Exclusive Insights
🔍 Insider Tips
Pay close attention to image-based questions as they are increasingly used to test clinical knowledge. Mastering the Integrated Teaching approach helps in solving complex clinical scenarios.
⭐ Unique Features
Functioning purely as a pass/fail licensing screen with a flat 50% qualifying mark, rather than any competitive ranking or percentile system, distinguishes FMGE structurally from nearly every other major Indian medical exam, including NEET UG and NEET PG, both of which rank candidates against each other rather than simply checking a fixed threshold. Its unlimited-attempts, no-age-limit retake policy is also considerably more forgiving than most Indian entrance exams, which typically cap attempts or set an age ceiling.
🎓 How This Score Impacts Your Application
Clearing FMGE is a mandatory, non-negotiable requirement for any India-citizen or OCI foreign medical graduate seeking to register and practice medicine in India — there is no alternative licensing pathway around it. Because the score itself doesn't factor into any competitive ranking or seat allocation the way NEET PG's does, FMGE functions purely as a qualifying gate rather than a comparative measure between candidates.
More insights: country notes, comparisons, myths, examiner tipsSee all â–Ÿ
🌍 Country-Specific Notes
FMGE is specific to India's medical licensing framework for foreign-trained graduates, relevant to a substantial number of Indian students who pursued MBBS-equivalent degrees in countries with more accessible medical school admission processes before returning to practice in India.
⚖ Comparison with Alternatives
Unlike NEET PG, which shares similar section-locked pacing and clinical content but ranks candidates competitively against each other for limited seats, FMGE simply checks whether a candidate clears a fixed 50% bar with no ranking or seat-allocation function attached at all. Compared to NEET UG or NEET PG's single-attempt-per-cycle structure, FMGE's unlimited retake policy across three annual sessions gives candidates considerably more flexibility to eventually clear the bar over time.
🆕 Recent Changes
NBEMS expanded FMGE from two to three annual sessions in 2026 (December/January, April/May, and August/September), with an additional October 2026 sitting also announced, reflecting a broader push to give candidates more frequent attempt opportunities.
🔜 Upcoming Changes
NBEMS has publicly rejected calls to lower the 50% qualifying bar despite ongoing pass-rate concerns, while continuing to explore additional session frequency as its primary response to candidate demand.
🧐 Myths vs Facts
A common misconception is that FMGE works like NEET UG or NEET PG, ranking candidates competitively against each other; in reality, it's a simple pass/fail licensing check against a flat 50% mark with no ranking or seat-allocation function at all. Another frequent assumption is that the unlimited-attempts policy makes an under-prepared first sitting low-risk — given how genuinely low the first-attempt pass rate has historically been, treating any single sitting casually rarely serves a candidate well.
📋 Post-Exam Steps
Once results are declared, a candidate who cleared the 50% mark should proceed directly to National Medical Commission registration, since FMGE itself has no further stages or interview process attached to it. A candidate who falls short should honestly assess which specific subject areas were weakest — using their own recall of the exam rather than a formal score breakdown, since NBEMS doesn't disclose section-wise results — before committing to the next available session.
🎯 Score Uses Beyond Admission
Beyond enabling National Medical Commission registration, a cleared FMGE result has no separate standardized use — it exists solely to license foreign medical graduates to practice in India.
❓ Frequently Asked Questions
How long is the FMGE score valid?+
A cleared FMGE result does not expire and remains valid for medical registration in India indefinitely.
How much does the FMGE cost?+
₹6,195 to ₹7,080 approx. (inclusive of 18% GST; exact amount varies slightly by session)
How often can I retake the FMGE?+
No limit on the number of attempts and no age limit — a candidate can reattempt at any future session until they clear the 50% qualifying mark.
When are FMGE results declared?+
Results are typically declared within a few weeks of each session's exam date.
Which universities accept the FMGE?+
Please check the official website for the full list of accepting institutions.
Is a calculator allowed in the FMGE?+
No — calculators and any electronic aids are strictly prohibited.
How should I prepare for the FMGE?+
Because FMGE tests the same broad clinical and pre-clinical medical knowledge base as NEET PG, though at a licensing rather than competitive-ranking level of difficulty, most effective preparation resembles NEET PG

📝
Register for FMGE
The licensing screen for Indians who studied medicine abroad, unlimited attempts allowed but a genuinely tough 50% bar that most first-timers don't clear
Register Now →
📊 Quick Facts
Official Site →
Conducted ByNational Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS)
Year Started2002
CategoryMedical Licensing Examination
Emailhttps://natboard.edu.in/
Last UpdatedSeptember 7, 2026
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